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Ballard’ Frank; 18743-1934. 
The mystery of painlessness 





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THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


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THE MYSTERY,” 
OF PAINLESSNESS 


An Appeal to Facts 


FRANK BALLARD, D.D., M.A., B.Sc. 
Author of “The Miracles of Unbelief,” etc. 


With Foreword by 
S. PARKES CADMAN, D.D. 





New York CuHIcaco 
Fleming H. Revell Company 


Lonpon AND EDINBURGH 


Copyright, McmMxxv1, by 
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY 


New York: 158 Fifth Avenue 
Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave. 
London: 21 Paternoster Square 
Edinburgh: 99 George Street 


FOREWORD 


HAVE read this manuscript with 

interest and pleasure. The author, 
Rev. Frank Ballard, is known to me as a 
gifted and accomplished writer, especially 
in apologetics. He has done splendid 
work on these lines for many years. 

The freshness, not to say originality, of 
his views and their clear and forcible 
statements are helpful, indeed. 

The problem with which he deals in this 
book comes before me in some form or 
other nearly every day, and I am grate- 
ful to have seen his wise treatment of it. 

| S. Parkes CapMAN. 
Brooklyn, N.Y. 


[5 ] 





II. 


III, 


CONTENTS 


Tue PROBLEM OF SUFFERING . " . 9 
Tue Marve. or Dairy Lire . ; . 380 
“SHEARFULLY AND WONDERFULLY Mapr” 58 


Tue Divine SECRET . A ry ; ia i! 


[7] 


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I 
THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


ROM time immemorial, long before 

the tragedies occurred which under- 
lie the book of Job, and caused the per- 
plexed lamentations of the Psalmists, 
humanity has been bewildered and sad- 
dened by the mystery of pain. The ter- 
rible amount of suffering among men, 
women and children has not only become 
more tragic in our days by reason of 
fuller information, but has continually 
bewildered thoughtful minds and over- 
whelmed tender hearts by its cruel in- 
tensity and inexplicable occurrence. It 
has thus become the favorite theme of all 
opponents of the Christian faith, as well 
as the hardest problem for sincere be- 
lievers. Sir Leslie Stephen, eminent man 
of letters, whose ability and probity no 


[9] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


one ever questioned, declared that the 
sight of the world’s tragedy made him an 
agnostic. Haeckel’s bitter words doubt- 
less found an echo in the minds of great 
numbers, when, in his later work, The 
Wonders of Life, he wrote: 


“As we do not seek to have our emotions 
gratified by poetic fictions, we are bound to 
point out that reason cannot detect the shadow 
of a proof of the existence and action of a 
conscious Providence, or loving Father in 
Heaven. Every year we read with horror the 
statistics of thousands of deaths from ship- 
wreck and railway accidents, earthquakes and 


landslips, wars and epidemics.” 


So that he went on to endorse Scho- 
penhauer’s pessimistic estimate, which 
speaks of 


“this miserable world; this cockpit of tortured 
and suffering beings, who can only survive by 
destroying each other, in which the capacity 
for pain grows with knowledge, and so reaches 
its height in man. To the palpable sophistry 


[10] 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


of Leibnitz we oppose a strict and honest proof 
that this world is the worst of all possible.” 


Even the great Huxley, despite his 
usual fair and judicious attitude, was led 
to write that 


“Since thousands of times a minute, were our 
ears only sharp enough, we should hear the 
sighs and groans of pain like those heard by 
Dante at the gate of hell, the world cannot be 
governed by what we call benevolence.” 


A few years later the plausible super- 
ficialities and dogmatisms of God and 
My Neighbor, written by Robert Blatch- 
ford—an English journalist, whose opin- 
ions were held in high esteem by the 
newspaper readers of Britain—troubled 
many Christian believers. But there can 
be no question that in regard to the mys- 
tery of pain he only wrote what very 
many felt and could not understand: 


“The world is full of sorrow, of pain, of 
hatred and crime, of strife and war. If God 


[11] 


{ 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


is a tender, loving, all-knowing, and_all- 
powerful Heavenly Father, why did He build 
the world on cruel lines? Why does He per- 
mit evil and pain to continue? Why does 
He not give the world peace, and health, and 
happiness? ” | 


Or, again, consider the case of Sir 
Francis Younghusband—orientalist, trav- 
eler and administrator—a man whose 
ability and sincerity are equally unques- 
tionable, who also, in his pathetic volume, 
Within, writes on this vexed theme. His 
experience is impressively summarized by 


H. G. Wells: 


“Tt is the confession of a man who lived with 
a complete confidence in Providence until he 
was already well advanced in years. He went 
through battles and campaigns; he filled posts 
of great honor and responsibility ; he saw much 
of the life of men, without altogether losing his 
faith. The loss of a child, an Indian famine, 
could shake it, but not overthrow it. ‘Then, 
coming back one day from some races in France, 
he was knocked down by an automobile, and 


[ 12 | 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


hurt very cruelly. He suffered terribly, both 
in body and mind. His sufferings caused much 
suffering also to others. He did his utmost to 
see the hand of a loving Providence in his and 
their disaster, and the torment it inflicted; but 
being a man of sterling honesty and a fine es- 
sential simplicity of mind, he confessed at last 
that he could not do so. His confidence in the 
benevolent intervention of God was altogether 
destroyed. His book tells of this shattering, 
and how laboriously he reconstructed his re- 
ligion upon less confident lines.” 


Such experiences might only too easily 
be reiterated. So that the summary of 
Dr. Peake, one of the ablest Biblical 
scholars now living, in the preface to his 
volume on The Problem of Suffering in 
the Old Testament, is all too true—‘I am 
only one of many, for whom the problem 
of pain constitutes the most powerful ob- 
jection to a theism otherwise adequate to 
our deepest needs.” All who have left 
youth behind them, and are facing life’s 
conflicts and difficulties with clear minds 


[13] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


and tender hearts, must sympathize with 
such an attitude. The very name of can- 
cer—not to mention other dire diseases— 
makes one shudder with harrowing memo- 
ries, if not also with depressing anxieties 
concerning living loved ones. 

There is, mercifully, another side to all 
this. Not merely in discounting the ex- 
aggerations and correcting the false state- 
ments of such one-sided estimates as those 
we have quoted, but also in the wonderful 
preventive as well as palliative work of 
modern medicine and surgery. We are, 
indeed, comforted today with such hopes 
as the world has never before known, 
thanks to the inestimable devotion of such 
men as Pasteur, Lister, Osler, Ross, Rog- 
ers, and a host of others whose work in the 
realm of medical science is known the 
world over, through whom diseases are 
being both overcome and prevented, while 
the public health is established to an un- 
precedented extent. Typhoid fever, scar- 
let fever, smallpox, diphtheria, are being 


[14] 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


reduced to a minimum. Plague is now 
seldom heard of, and even for lepers hope 
has blossomed into wonderful fruitage, in 
numberless cases of real and permanent 
recovery. It is, however, really necessary, 
in passing, to point out that all this im- 
provement is in direct and palpable con- 
tradiction to the modern and mischievous 
craze which calls itself Christian Science. 
For this cult is as practically dangerous 
as it is theoretically absurd. ‘To teach 
that the human body is a myth, and that 
all pain is a delusion—as is most definitely 
done in Mrs. Eddy’s incoherent manual— 
is doctrine only fit for the inmates of an 
asylum. While practically this fanati- 
cism would stop all these noble servants 
of mankind in their beneficent work, 
would shut up all our hospitals, put an 
end to all our medical missions, and let 
loose among our populations all types of 
infection, as well as block the path of 
still greater improvement by the muddled 
metaphysics of an unintelligible book 


[15 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


which pours scorn on all real medical 
science. 

Meanwhile, it is absolutely certain 
that only on such methods of develop- 
ing hygiene and medical care as are 
represented by such famous men as Sir 
George Newman, Sir Arthur News- 
holme, Dr. Saleeby, and many others 
of like character and devotion, do all 
human hopes for the elimination of dis- 
ease and the further reduction of the 
mystery of pain, depend. Already the 
span of life through their efforts is so 
lengthened that the child born today has 
the fair prospect of twelve years more 
of healthy life than his grandfather had 
when he arrived. Indeed, all the future 
is brightening in the way so forcefully 
referred to by Sir E. Ray Lankester in 
his Romanes Lecture; and if only the 
counsels of the New Health Society, so 
earnestly recommended by Sir W. Ar- 
buthnot Lane, a foremost authority on the 
diseases of children, are adopted, human 


[ 16 ] 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


suffering will be reduced to a minimum 
hitherto unknown, 

Many painful questions, however, still 
remain, and some of our most distressing 
problems seem unanswerable. But it is 
itself a problem why, amid all who are 
thus troubled—either sadly and patiently 
as 1s the genuine Christian, or bitterly 
and blatantly as are some disbelievers— 
scarcely any take, apparently, the least 
notice of, let alone do justice to, another 
and far greater mystery, compared with 
which the whole mystery of pain is but as 
a shrimp-pool by the side of the ocean. 

After close acquaintance with the Ilt- 
erature of disbelief for half a century, I 
cannot recall one single case in which any 
fair or worthy reference has been made to 
the undeniable and immeasurable mystery 
of painlessness, through which humanity 
continues not only to exist, but to do al- 
most all its work, and enter into all the 
enjoyments of which human life is capa- 
ble. But this greater mystery of pain- 


[17] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


lessness is none the less real, ceaseless, 
unquestionable, measureless, and inexpli- 
cable. It not only gives the lie direct to 
the agnostic suggestion that this world is 
“built on cruel lines,” but it affords an 
actual basis for all that faith and patience 
and hope which the Christian Gospel so 
earnestly urges. It is open to demonstra- 
tion just in the degree in which we are pre- 
pared to study and appreciate the human 
body, in the light of all that modern scien- 
tific knowledge which is ever becoming 
more meticulous and exact. It is by no 
means easy to condense into a few pages 
what is really matter for a lifetime’s study; 
but at least an outline may be drawn which 
only needs truthful and accurate expan- 
sion to make it an overwhelming confirma- 
tion of the One Hundred and Thirty-ninth 
Psalm, and an unmistakable, invaluable 
buttress of humble Christian belief. 
First, as to the great world of life below 
the human level. When Haeckel quoted 
Schopenhauer with such approval, to the 


[18 ] 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


effect that this world was merely a ‘“cock- 
pit of tortured and suffering beings, who 
can only survive by destroying each 
other,” 1t needed but the careful observa- 
tion of an hour, anywhere, to demonstrate 
the utter falsity of such a gibe. Tenny- 
son’s well-known lines about nature’s be- 
ing “red in tooth and claw with ravine,” 
and so shrieking against the Divine benefi- 
cence, have been far too often quoted. 
For they are so utterly one-sided as to il- 
lustrate what he himself elsewhere said, 
that “a lie which is half a truth,” is “a 
harder matter to fight,” than a downright 
lie. It would be easy also to show how, in 
other moods and words, Huxley answers 
his own pessimism. But it must suffice 
here to appreciate a testimony which can 
neither be gainsaid nor underestimated. 
It was Charles Darwin who wrote, con- 
cerning that very struggle for existence 
which has appalled so many lesser men: 


“When we reflect on this struggle, we may 
console ourselves with the full belief that the 


[19 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


war of nature is not incessant, that no fear is 
felt, that death is generally swift, and that the 
vigorous, the healthy, and the happy, survive 
and multiply.” 


How emphatically this testimony is en- 
dorsed by such competent witnesses as 
Dr. Alfred Russel Wallace—who “hit on” 
the theory of the survival of the fittest 
simultaneously with Darwin—and many 
others, must be here omitted, though it is 
definite and unmistakable. For the mo- 
ment we will confine our attention to 
human beings—although what is pointed 
out applies equally, mutatis mutandis, to 
the whole living world, and overwhelming 
illustrations thereof could easily be sup- 
plied. But it will be more than enough to 
appreciate the truth as it relates to men, 
women, and children. Such appreciation, 
however, will require much closer ac- 
quaintance with the actual facts of every 
day’s life than is customary. For it is 
only through the genuine, careful, honest, 
and thorough study of these facts, that 


[ 20 ] 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


the right standpoint can be attained for 
the just comparison of the two great mys- 
teries of painlessness and pain, amidst 
which our life’s brief hour is spent. 

In proportion to the clear thoroughness 
of such appreciation of the commonest 
daily actualities of our own existence, will 
be the irresistible and overwhelming con- 
clusion reached above. Eiven this, that 
when the mystery of pain is taken at its 
worst—to be quite sure, let us say its aw- 
ful worst—it is but a trifle, when put 
into fair comparison with that ceaseless 
and unmeasured mystery of painlessness 
which the overwhelming majority of some 
1,800,000,000 of human beings on this 
planet, at any given moment, exemplify. 
It is confessedly a tremendous avowal, to 
estimate human pain as a comparative 
trifle. Far too tremendous to be hastily 
made or easily accepted. Certainly it is 
not here hastily made, but only after 
more than half a century of such oppor- 
tunities and duties as only come to med- 


[ 21 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


ical men, and to Christian ministers who 
are faithful to the calls of a pastorate 
either in town or country. In the light of 
many such experiences, it seems heartless 
to appear to underrate the extent and in- 
tensity of human suffering, and incredible 
that there can be any greater mystery. 
And yet if it be true—as will here be 
shown—that the mystery of painlessness 
does indeed exceed that of human pain, 
enormously and immeasurably, as surely 
as in any great city the number of healthy 
working people exceeds the number of in- 
valids, it is all the present answer that 
need be given by a reasonable faith, to 
such diatribes of disbelief as are quoted 
above. It is, indeed, quite sufficient in 
itself to justify and confirm the strong 
avowal of the late Sir Henry Thompson, 
so long prominently associated with the 
Royal College of Surgeons and London 
University, who set himself the task of 
twenty years’ investigation—“solely for 
the purpose of seeking truth for my own 


[ 22 ] 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


personal needs and enlightenment’’—in 
facing all the facts of life, amid all the 
special opportunities that came necessar- 
ily to a widely-known expert surgeon. 
Here is his deliberate and openly avowed 
conclusion : 


“T was now assured, by evidence which I could 
not resist, that all which man—with his limited 
knowledge and experience—has learned to re- 
gard as due to Supreme Power and Wisdom, 
although immeasurably beyond his comprehen- 
sion, is also associated with the exercise of an 
absolutely beneficent influence over all living 
things, of every grade, which exist within its 
range.” 


That is, at all events, a firm natural 
foundation for a faith which would be as 
intelligent and honest as humble and 
sincere, 

The well-worn assumptions of agnosti- 
cism that if God were really the loving 
Heavenly Father whom Jesus Christ re- 
veals, there would be either no pain at all, 
or else only the wicked would be ill, while 


[ 28 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


all good people would be healthy, have 
been shown again and again to be as irra- 
tional in philosophy as contrary to Chris- 
tian faith. While in regard to the much 
more difficult and often harrowing query, 
as to the exact incidence and tragic in- 
tensity of some cases of individual suffer- 
ing, we are still in the same position as 
the prophets and psalmists of old. The 
pleading of Jeremiah (12:1); the bewil- 
derment of the psalmist (Ps. 73: 1-14, 
etc.) ; and the anguished entreaty of the 
apostle (2 Cor. 12:8); all repeat them- 
selves in our modern experience, their 
wider range causing even deeper perplex- 
ity. With our present faculties, and in 
this life only, numberless cases of poign- 
ant but undeserved suffering must ever 
remain inexplicable. Eivery one with an 
observant eye and a tender heart will have 
chastening memories of instances which 
seemed to be cruelly contrary to all that 
human judgment would have expected or 
awarded. Why such a noble and high- 


[ 24 ] 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


souled patriot as William Ewart Glad- 
stone, or such a saintly and devoted 
woman as Catherine Booth, or such a 
lofty and inspiring character as Sir 
Henry Jones, should be subjected to the 
horrors of cancer, we shall never know this 
side of the grave. But if our faith re- 
mains, we can wait with patience for the 
revelations of the other side. The ques- 
tion of questions is whether we can retain 
such faith, in face of all the painful hap- 
penings which thus trouble us, and which 
are continually so gruesomely tabulated 
by the clever and irrepressible rationalist 
press. That is confessedly the crux of 
Christian theism. Me 

And this, in plain terms, is the answer. 
If on rational principles faith is shaken 
by the mystery of pain, upon the very 
same principles it is restored, established, 
and made unshakably triumphant, by the 


i 


greater mystery of painlessness. If God_ 


is rightly credited with all that dark side 
of human existence which is not definitely 


[ 25 ] 


} 
aS 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


due to moral evil, then certainly, in all 
honesty, He must also be regarded as the 
ultimate source of all that bright and 
happy side of human being which is mani- 
festly not man’s own creation. When, 
thereafter, these two estimates are fairly 
compared, it becomes plain that the bright 
side exceeds the dark, as truly as the light 
and heat of the mid-day sun exceed the 
cold illumination of the moon. 

But more than that. If we were here 
considering the whole mystery of good, as 
against that of evil, such a comparison 
would be enormously enhanced. For in 
spite of all the ancient theological depress- 
ing estimates of human nature, from Au- 
gustine through Calvin to this hour, and 
all the deplorable and degrading publica- 
tions of humanity’s worst doings in our 
daily press, the amount of good cease- 
lessly energizing in mankind immeasur- 
ably exceeds that of evil in our midst. 
There are also valid reasons for believing 
that such excess is going to grow from 


[ 26 | 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


more to more with every succeeding gen- 
eration, until wars shall be no more than. 
tragic memories, and modern society shall 
actually embody the lofty ideals of the 
Lord’s Prayer. 

Here, however, for the moment, we will 
close our eyes to all but physical facts, and 
base our inferences on these alone. We 
will take as a typical case the daily life of 
an average normal healthy man, who is 
not ruining his body by vicious habits, and 
note carefully, as much as our space per- 
mits, what it really involves. Of the 
many mistranslations in the Authorized 
Version of the Bible, the reference in 
Phil. 3:21 to “this vile body” is one of 
the worst. For no falser estimate is con- 
ceivable. Its most frequent use occurs, 
unfortunately, just where it is most out of 
place, namely, in the funeral service in the 
Anglican Prayer Book. But whenever 
and wherever such a misrepresentation 1s 
uttered in public, the reader ought to fol- 
low it up with the plain reading of Psalm 


[ 27 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


139, which is both more true and more sig- 
nificant now than when it was written, 
some two millenniums and a half ago. 
And it should be emphasized by the un- 
mistakable protest of the apostle—“Do 
you not know that your bodies are part of 
Christ’s body?—Do you not know that 
the body of every one of you is a temple 
of the Holy Spirit, whom you have from 
God?—Glorify God therefore in your 
body.” Alas, that it did not avail to 
prevent the cruel follies of asceticism in 
following ages. In the light of the 
New Testament, the proper name for 
such malpractices is not Christian self- 
discipline, but pagan self-delusion. 

We will here accept thankfully the high 
estimate of psalmist and apostle, and 
proceed to appreciate it, as we needs must 
do, in the fuller light and more exact 
knowledge which modern science has 
brought us. 

With just one caveat. All that here fol- 
lows relates to the body of aman. But the 


[ 28 ] 


THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING 


most wonderful thing in physical creation 
is the body of a woman. The crowning 
mystery of mysteries, far too marvelous 
and holy for superficial description at the 
moment, is that process of gestation which 
some pious fanatics have even sought to 
besmirch with evil, by applying to it— 
under the strange spell of bibliolatry— 
the remorseful wail of a murderous adul- 
terer in Psalm 51:5. The witness of the 
New Testament is happily plain enough 
to the contrary, and there was never any 
need whatever for the Romish device of 
the immaculate conception to protect a 
woman from moral evil in passing through 
her hour of holy anguish. Moreover, even 
the throes of childbirth become, as Jesus 
said (John 16:21), but a transient trifle 
compared with the following years of 
painless bodily peace, enriched with the 
added incomparable spiritual joys of 
motherhood, which in the vast majority 
of cases ensue. 


[ 29 ] 


II 
THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


ET us now consider what really 
happens in the lesser marvel of 

the daily life of an average normal man. 
When justice is done to it, we shall find 
that it is simply overwhelming, alike in 
the detail of its mystery and the benefi- 
cence of its totality. Out of every hun- 
dred persons met in an ordinary day’s 
intercourse, it is more than probable that 
at least ninety of them have never given 
a moment’s thought to their bodies all day 
long—with just the exception of satisfy- 
ing a healthy appetite at- meal times. 
And even then, ninety and nine out of 
every hundred hungry mortals never 
spend a moment in asking whence the 
appetite comes, or how it is that food 
satisfies and sends them away comforted. 


[ 30 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


In a word, through all the hours of the 
day they have never known that they had 
a body at all. That is the blessed pain- 
lessness which we call health—a boon, it 
is often truly said, which can only be 
fully appreciated when it is lost. In good 
health no man knows, at any given mo- 
ment, where any part of his body really 
is. It is the special business of toothache, 
or lumbago, or gout, or stomach-ache, to 
inform him where certain portions of his 
body are, in order that he may pay them 
a little more attention, or repent of the 
injustice which he has done them. But 
with the average man, the ordinary blessed 
unconsciousness of his body, the painless- 
ness which sets him free to use all his 
thoughts and energies in the multitudi- 
nous directions of a day’s work, whether 
with hand or brain, is naturally and uni- 
versally forgotten. 

So that it becomes necessary to shake 
oneself into attention, and ask plainly 
what is actually taking place in this our 


[ 31 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


marvelous microcosm, whereby all the 
day’s activities become possible. Com- 
mon experience says—nothing; daily 
business says—never mind; current con- 
vention says—it doesn’t matter; Godless 
superficiality says—there is nothing worth 
noticing. But these inanities are not 
good enough. Let us look more carefully 
at what is going on. Part, at least, of all 
the marvelous happenings we can appre- 
ciate, if we will. The whole truth—even 
in summary—as to all the physiological 
intricacies of even one hour’s healthy life 
cannot be told, either here or anywhere. 
But it will suffice for our present pur- 
pose to take just a brief and partial, 
though careful, glance at unquestionable 
facts which relate only to the main ele- 
ments of the case, in the ordinary daily 
life of any and every man or woman who 
“enjoys good health.” 

The structure of the human body is 
scientifically divided into distinct systems, 
such as bony, muscular, vascular, respira- 


[ 82 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


tory, digestive, excretory, etc. But for 
the sake of the general reader, we will be 
content to state the facts popularly, albeit 
none the less accurately. Take the case 
of an average business man. Let us fol- 
low him throughout the day. After a 
good night’s rest, he rises refreshed, en- 
joys his breakfast, and sallies forth to his 
office. There he applies himself at once, 
without bodily pain or hindrance, to all 
the intricacies of modern commerce, uses 
his brains, and calls upon those around 
him to do the same. With a luncheon 
interval, this continues until evening, 
when he goes home tired, to seek rest or 
recreation, there or elsewhere, until once 
more he loses consciousness in sleep. It 
all seems very simple—so easy that it not 
only goes on without thought, but may be 
taken for granted again on the morrow, 
nay, for an endless succession of morrows, 
so that journeys may be planned and holi- 
days arranged, without any query as to 
whether they will be possible. But mean- 


[ 33 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


while, all the time, what has really been 
going on inside him? 

(1) If a man is to stand upright, let 
alone walk, or run, or work, there must be 
a strong and firm, though also light and 
flexible, bony skeleton, as the foundation 
of the whole frame. The fact that the 
whole vast army of vertebrate animals 
shares with man this wonderful posses- 
sion, does not in the least mitigate, but 
rather increase, the marvel of its sym- 
metry and utility. ‘Thus our business 
man has some two hundred and fifty 
bones, marvelously tied together by liga- 
ments, whereby the thirty-three vertebrez 
of the spine, sixty-four bones of the up- 
per limbs, sixty-two of the lower limbs, 
with twenty-four ribs, and twenty-two 
skull-bones, are all united to subserve one 
organic whole, in a fashion which, if fully 
considered, would more than occupy all 
these pages, and would alone justify their 
main contention. We are compelled to 
omit the rest; but it seems positively 


[ 34 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


necessary to think a moment more about 
this human spine, which is seldom or 
never thought about, until some form of 
spinal disease or accident reminds us of 
its existence. Yet a moment’s scrutiny 
suffices to supply much more than mere 
information. The spine, be it remem- 
bered, has to be the mainstay of the whole 
structure. Therefore it must be a firm, 
strong unity. But it must also be light, 
or the whole would be too heavy for loco- 
motion. It must also be flexible, or no 
bending of the body would be possible. 
It must also be hollow, for somehow, 
throughout its whole length, there has to 
go that spinal cord from which the whole 
nervous system emanates for the control 
of the muscles. And this cord must be, 
by reason of its indescribable delicacy, 
protected from all injury. 

How is all this managed? By the 
tying together of thirty-three bones, all 
unlike and queer-shaped, but so firmly 
joined that they form a graceful curve, 


[ 35 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


as beautiful as useful. Nor is that all. 
If it were, every step would mean con- 
cussion of the brain. In between all these 
vertebree are delicate but wonderfully 
useful cushions of cartilage, which pre- 
vent any undue jolt, and so make walk- 
ing a pleasurable possibility. Whilst 
from out these same vertebre, all down 
its length, issue those marvelous nerve- 
threads upon which every motion of every 
limb depends. ‘Thus, then, in full dis- 
charge of all its functions, this wondrous 
structure holds together all the rest of the 
body—and the man knows nothing of it. 
No thought of a backbone ever occurs to 
him, in all his goings to and fro, or in all 
the swinging of his limbs which the day’s 
duty or pleasure may involve. In all its 
continual intricate movements, no pain is 
caused, nor even consciousness of motion. 

(2) But bones, however remarkable in 
shape, and marvelously tied together, 
could do nothing without sets of muscles 
so attached to them by tendons as to make 


[ 36 ] 





THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


possible all the ever-varying motions of 
the body. Of these muscular bands there 
are at least five hundred, many of which 
are simultaneously at work all through 
the day; and yet, unless rheumatism or 
lumbago should come in as a reminder, 
the man knows nothing about it. How 
much this means in regard to manual 
labor in general, and some kinds of it, 
such as the work of stevedores or miners, 
in particular, must be left to the reader’s 
own thoughtful estimate. 

Suppose, now, we turn from work to 
recreations, whether at home or in the 
open air, and ask how it comes to pass 
that these are so painlessly enjoyable. 
For this is certain, that if each individual 
in the crowds which fill our theatres and 
ball grounds, were reminded by pain of 
the exact locality of a tooth, or an ear, or 
a toe, these places would all empty them- 
selves more quickly than they filled. 
Does any imitator of Paderewski ever 
consider how it is that he can practise for 


[ 87 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


hours at a stretch? Or any admirer of 
Kreisler ask how that combined motion 
of fingers, wrist, and forearm is possible, 
and often so long maintained? Probably 
not. Yet it were all impossible, but for 
the marvelous conjuncture of twenty lit- 
tle bones in each hand, securely bound up 
with eight more in the wrist, and three 
more above them. So then, we have fifty- 
six small bones, and six larger ones, in 
continual, complex, rapid, codrdinated 
motion, and yet no pain, no friction, no 
inflammation. How is that brought 
about? On the next sea voyage, watch 
the engines, and ask the engineer why he 
keeps dodging about and putting his 
hand on this and that and the other part 
of his machine, and he will smile at your 
ignorance in being unaware that “she 
may get hot.” Then what does he do to 
prevent such a hindrance? He lubricates 
all the parts that rub together, so that 
friction may at least be reduced to a 
minimum. ‘Then ask him further why he 


[ 38 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


does not get the engine to lubricate itself ? 
He will now wonder whether you are 
sane. And yet—it is precisely that, no 
less, that the artist’s arms and hands 
and fingers are always doing painlessly, 
thanks to the indescribably wonderful 
synovial glands which first manufacture 
the human lubricating oil, and then apply 
it where it is most needed, without any 
fee or reminder—and equally without any 
thanks, 

At a recent remarkable exhibition of 
piano playing, I carefully calculated that 
during the recital there had been not less 
than two million commands issued from 
the virtuoso’s brain to his fingers, all 
obeyed without murmuring, and at the 
end without his exhaustion. So painless 
was all this mechanical execution, that 
neither he nor his listeners thought any- 
thing of it. They rightly admired his 
skill, but thought nothing of the means 
whereby alone it was possible. But the 
fortune of a Rockefeller awaits the man 


[ 39 | 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


who can invent, for any machine of hu- 
man construction, such self-lubrication as 
every day’s work and every night’s con- 
cert, everywhere and always, exhibit. 

Or again. Sixty thousand human be- 
ings congregate to witness a football 
game. Does any one of them, least of 
all the players themselves, spend one sin- 
gle moment in asking how it comes to pass 
that men can so wildly dash about, and so 
violently kick, or strangely twist their 
bodies, without putting all their limbs out 
of joint? Probably not. And yet—if 
only by some benevolent power they could 
be compelled for once to study fairly 
the ball-and-socket joint of the shoulder 
and the hip, they would truly hold their 
breath at every match they afterwards 
watched. Still, in most cases, indeed al- 
most all cases, their anxiety would be un- 
necessary. For the joint which is most of 
all in use, is most of all protected. Not 
only is the hip joint which permits all 
the continual kicking wonderfully self- 


[ 40 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


lubricated, but the head of the femur, or 
thigh bone, is actually tied in to its con- 
taining cup, so that there may be the 
maximum amount of painless freedom 
with the minimum of risk of losing the 
leg after some mighty kick. Verily, if 
the players were logical they would close 
every game with the Doxology. 

And the spectators would join in, if 
they also were reasonable. For much as 
they enjoy their shouting, it is necessary 
to remind them that that too is all muscu- 
lar. And surely the muscles which rule 
the vocal cords are not less but more won- 
derful, for being so much more delicate. 
When excitement carries the crowd away, 
we read that they “shouted themselves 
hoarse.” But the papers which report 
that never pause to ask how it is that all 
men and women and children everywhere 
in all their speaking or singing, are not 
afflicted with the pain and hindrance of 
hoarseness. <A little while ago it was re- 
ported that Tetrazzini, under an acute 


[ 41 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


attack of laryngitis, was forbidden by the 
eminent specialist whom she consulted, to 
fulfil an important engagement, and was 
so troubled thereby that she burst into 
tears. But do those who listen enrap- 
tured to her normal voice, or have been 
carried away by the charm of Jeritza or 
Galli-Curci, ever ask how such entrancing 
melodies are possible without the constant 
recurrence of laryngitis? Is it nothing, 
that all singing is as painless for the 
singer as delightful for the audience? If, 
say for just one great concert, all the 
audience as well as all the artists, were 
held through all the performance by 
laryngitis, maybe afterwards they would 
appreciate the mystery of painlessness in 
their throat—unconsciousness—as never 
before. But a painless throat, or limb, is 
only a fraction of the mystery of the 
wonder-work of the manifold muscular 
development which, with blissful pain- 
lessness, permeates the whole human 


body. 
[ 42 ] 


\ 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


(3) But this inscrutable development 
of bone and muscle could never take place 
without an adequate and constant supply 
of blood. It is particularly necessary for 
_the purpose of these pages, to call atten- 
tion to as much detail as is possible, in 
order to emphasize the mystery of the 
painless co-working of innumerable parts. 
So here we may well ask—what is blood? 
Not a red fluid, as all children and most 
men think, but a colorless fluid, contain- 
ing almost incredible numbers of tiny 
microscopic bodies, corpuscles, which 
make it appear red. How microscopi- 
cally tiny they are may be gathered from 
the fact that in one drop of blood there 
are at least 5,000,000 of them, besides 
some 30,000 other little white bodies of 
greatest importance—for they are na- 
ture’s scavengers, and our valiant defend- 
ers from disease. 

But consider now, only the red. They 
flow ceaselessly through the arteries and 
veins like a stream of infinitesimal 


[ 43 | 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


rounded tea-cakes, and upon that uncon- 
scious circulation our life depends. As to 
their numbers, the ordinary man weigh- 
ing, say, one hundred and seventy pounds, 
has in his circulating stream, according to 
Huxley—a competent and careful ob- 
server—some 800,000,000,000. And if 
these were just taken out and laid flat in 
touch with one another, they would cover 
a space of 3,300 square yards. Whilst if 
they were arranged in a single line, just 
touching, they would reach 200,000 miles. 
The average life of one of these cor- 
puscles is a fortnight, so that there has to 
be a ceaseless manufacture of fresh ones. 
Hence, if a man lives to be seventy, the 
corpuscles which in sweet unconsciousness 
have been formed in his body during that 
period, if put edge to edge in a line, 
would reach three times the distance of 
this planet from the sun, some 280,- 
000,000 miles. Where they are born, 
together with the details of their manu- 
facture, cannot be discussed here—but 


[ 44 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


unless a man should suffer from per- 
nicious anemia, this wondrous manufac- 
ture of hosts of living bodies out of his 
food, goes on painlessly, day by day, 
through all his years. 

(4) Now further. We speak quite 
glibly about circulation. But circulation 
means motion continuously maintained. 
Does the average man know or care in 
the least, whence this motion comes, or 
how it so persists? In the vast majority 
of cases he has never yet known that he 
has a heart, so painlessly has its mighty 
work been done. But of a truth there is, 
proportionately to its size, no mightier 
work being done on earth. It is a little 
force-pump, six inches by four, beating 
rhythmically some seventy times in every 
minute—that is, 4,200 times each hour, 
and 37,000,000 times in a year. But how 
does it come to beat at all? And whence 
comes the rhythm of its impulses? To 
suggest that rhythm comes from nothing, 
or by chance, is in either case a contradic- 


[ 45 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


tion in terms. ‘The fact remains that if a 
man should live to be seventy, his heart 
will have driven his blood through his 
arteries, about four and one-half ounces 
at each stroke, some 8,000,000,000 times 
—and he has known nothing of it. Yet, 
during all his years, this marvelous little 
engine has done work, every twenty-four 
hours, equivalent to lifting thirty-two 
tons one foot from the ground. Thus m 
the seventy years, it has lifted at least 
840,000 foot-tons. During the same time, 
the blood will have been made to travel, in 
his body, not less than 25,000 miles. And 
all this painlessly. 

(5) Meanwhile, another marvel, equally 
real, great, and inscrutable, has been go- 
ing on. Unless a man has an attack of 
indigestion, he never thinks what becomes 
of his food when once he has swallowed 
it. The threefold necessary digestion in 
mouth, stomach, and intestines is quite 
unconscious, and therefore counts for 
nothing. Indeed, Robert Blatchford, 


[ 46 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


when trying in one of his books to explain 
away conscience, remarks that “it is no 
more mysterious than the stomach’’—as 
if the stomach and digestion were all 
perfectly simple and easily explained. 
Whereas the ultimate mystery of the 
stomach, along with that of the duodenum, 
the pancreas, the small and large intes- 
tine, is as insoluble, in spite of all our 
modern knowledge, as any miracle in the 
Bible, or any difficulty in Christian doc- 
trine. What does the man in the street, 
or the millionaire in a fashionable hotel, 
know or care for the fact that his food has 
to pass through these two intestinal tubes 
to the length of some thirty feet? If the 
wonderful, beautiful, and absolutely ne- 
cessary little “villi” of the small intestine 
alone were smoothed out, they would 
occupy a space of more than fifty square 
yards. ‘Through the course of all these, 
absorption goes on, though no man of 
science really knows how. Nor does it 
ever occur, either to the agricultural la- 


[ 47 | 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


borer or the gourmand, to ask how, see- 
ing that these long tubes are necessarily 
coiled up in the body, the food during its 
digestion is propelled along the intestine 
—why should there not be every day some 
stoppage in the bowels, with fatal results? 
As to the total process of digestion, that 
is far too complex to admit of even brief 
summary here. Enough that for ninety 
per cent. of humanity, it is as painless as 
it is wonderful and necessary. The mir- 
acle of this painlessness cannot be better 
put than in the words of Dr. Ronald 
C. Macfie, eminent writer on medical 
subjects: 


“It is very extraordinary to reflect that 
man’s brain cells, and blood cells, and muscles, 
and eyes, and teeth, and bones, are all made of 
such things as grains of a cultivated grass, and 
mutton chops, and red herrings, and apples, 
and oranges, and potatoes, and cheese. We put 
a spoonful of porridge into our mouths, and in 
a few hours’ time it may be part of one of the 
wonderful cells in the brain; we crunch a nut 


[ 48 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


between our teeth, and in a few hours’ time it 
may be woven into the retina of the eye.” 


Yes—and yet every day, in America 
alone, there are scores of millions of men 
and women who painlessly eat and drink, 
and reap the fruit of all this marvelous 
work within their bodies—and think no 
more about it. 

(6) But they also breathe; though this 
again excites no astonishment, and occa- 
sions no thankfulness, no thought—until 
they get bronchitis, or pneumonia. Yet 
during every ordinary day, the average 
man breathes 1,000 times each hour, and 
inhales six hundred gallons of air; that is 
14,400 gallons in a day, inhaling and ex- 
haling all the time in painless forgetful- 
ness of what he is doing. Of course, he 
has no choice herein. If he would live, he 
must breathe. But with almost all men 
and women, as with children, there it 
ends. It is nothing to any one of them 
that in order to purify the blood, through 


[ 49 | 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


the oxygen of the air, there must be in the 
ever-forgotten lungs not less than 700,- 
000,000 air cells; which, if spread out flat, 
would cover a total surface of one hun- 
dred and twenty square yards—that is, 
enough to occupy the whole floor of a 
room twelve feet square. But these mi- 
nute cells are also connected with the 
necessary capillaries—tiny tubes—which, 
if stretched out in a single line, would 
reach across the Atlantic. 

- Does the man in the street, or in the 
office, or on the train, ever think of this? 
No; why should he? There is no pain to 
remind him. No; he just uses all this 
wondrous apparatus 20,000 times every 
twenty-four hours, and treats it all as 
nothing—unless he gets a bad cough. 
Then he murmurs at the mystery of pain 


“and, if he is sufficiently rationalistic, de- 


nounces the idea of a Providence that 
permits such things. But it is ignorant 
ingratitude. For the cough is not a dis- 
ease at all; it is only a reminder that there 


[ 50 ] 


THE MARVEL OF DAILY LIFE 


is something wrong with his breathing 
apparatus; and an effort on the part of 
Nature to clear it away, and restore to 
him his lost mystery of painlessness. 

(7) Let us assume that the cough is 
cured, and his breathing no longer trou- 
bles him. He is then free to do his daily 
work. Which means that he, in common 
with all those around him, has to “use his 
brains.” In our time, certainly, there is 
ever-increasing demand for brain-work; 
and no adequate summary can be made 
of the extent to which, from the child at 
school to the university professor, or the 
city merchant, or the Prime Minister, 
brain-work is today a downright neces- 
sity. It is the more remarkable how very 
few brain-workers ever think of their 
brains. This marvelous, unparalleled 
apparatus works so painlessly, that in 
ninety-nine cases out of every hundred, 
the busiest brain-worker has never known 
that he had any brains at all. He daily 
thinks, feels, wills, estimates, calculates, 


[ 51 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


hears, speaks, decides, without ever for 
one moment asking how he so demon- 
strates his sanity and intelligence—until 
he gets a headache; and then the mystery 
of brief pain makes him completely ob- 
livious to the preceding greater mystery 
of painlessness. 


[ 52 | 


ITI 


“FEARFULLY AND WONDER- 
FULLY MADE” 


UT what really is this brain from 
which so much is expected, and by 
which so much is accomplished? Well, it 
is to look at, a round, wrinkled, pinkish, 
flabby mass, weighing about three pounds. 
But the wonder of its working is beyond 
all science to understand—however much 
we now know of which our forefathers 
never dreamed. It would require a whole 
library to do it even partial justice. Suf- 
fice it to say, in summary, that science can 
no more unravel the painless mystery of 
the inner working of that cerebrum and 
cerebellum which are in every human 
skull, than theologians can clear up the 
mystery of the “hypostatic union,” relat- 
ing to the person of Christ. We have to 


[ 53 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


be content to recognize and appreciate the 
fact that our daily work—i. e., all our 
thoughts and words and deeds—depends 
unmistakably upon what happens in the 
mere thin skin of this brain, the “gray 
layer,” which is only about one-fifth of 
an inch in thickness, but contains some 
9,000,000,000 distinct cells. All these, 
moreover, are in definite connection with 
the innumerable nerve fibres which con- 
stitute the internal, or white matter. The 
cerebrum, or larger frontal portion—with 
its two hemispheres—is inseparably con- 
nected with the smaller part, the cere- 
bellum, at the lower back of the head. 
Inquire, then, of your clever, energetic, 
successful, city merchant, whether his 
cerebrum is in good working order, and 
he wonders if you are sane. So utterly 
unconscious is he of the incalculable 
activities of the innumerable cell connec- 
tions, in the work of every hour, nay, 
every minute, of his busy days. 

Or ask your highly paid athlete if he 


[ 54 | 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


appreciates his cerebellum, and he will 
think you have escaped from an asylum. 
So painlessly—and one might truly say, 
miraculously, for the indescribable won- 
der of it all—have the commands for 
codrdinations from the higher brain been 
carried out. And yet—without the mar- 
vel of its ceaseless working, he would be 
more helpless than a baby learning to 
walk. Let but a needle be inserted into 
certain parts of it, and he would kick no 
more. It is an interesting, and to some 
folk very exciting pastime, to watch a 
football or baseball game. Does one in 
ten thousand ever consider how it comes 
to pass that the pitcher can so deliver the 
ball; or the batter so strike it; or the 
half-back so kick a goal? No; famiuli- 
arity breeds contempt, and an insoluble 
mystery of good becomes, to the popular 
mind, a worthless commonplace. 

(8) We may not, however, quite leave 
even this brief appreciation of the human 
brain at this point, without considering 


[ 55 | 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


more carefully its nerve connections 
throughout the whole body. There are, 
happily, today many valuable books eas- 
ily accessible, in which this subject is 
worthily considered; but they are crowded 
out by the rush of football, cricket, tennis, 
and pictures. Whence it follows that the 
population, as a whole, knows nothing 
and cares less about that marvelous nerv- 
ous system through which alone all their 
activities and enjoyments are possible. 
But we must here spend a moment upon 
nerves, for whether the reader be a “nerv- 
ous” subject or not, it is through the 
measureless mystery of the ramification of 
infinitesimal nerve-threads throughout his 
whole body, that his life is possible, let 
alone enjoyable. The spinal cord has 
been mentioned above; but mere mention 
is utterly inadequate to do it justice. It 
is true that we are surrounded on all 
hands, in Nature, by marvels which baffle 
description and transcend imagination. 
But amidst them all, it may be said with 


[ 56 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


truth that the human brain and its in- 
separable nervous system constitute the 
greatest wonder of the universe so far as 
we know it. Think, for one moment only, 
of what this spinal cord really involves. 
From it, through its whole length, minute 
and delicate nerve-threads are conveyed 
directly from the brain to the extremities. 
Every motion of the fingers through 
which this page is typewritten, represents 
a command from the cerebrum, through 
the cerebellum, to the muscles of the arm, 
hand, and fingers, by means of these nerve 
threads. The same applies to all the un- 
speakably rapid movements of the hands 
and fingers of a Pachman or a Kubelik. 
It must, also, be borne in mind that in 
every such motion there is a double nerve 
action. ‘That is to say, there are two dis- 
tinct kinds of nerve-threads, the afferent 
—whose function it is to convey to the 
brain some impression from without—and 
the efferent, which carry from the brain 
its response to that impression. ‘Think 


[ 57 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


of this happening so many times in a sec- 
ond as must be in playing one of Liszt’s 
or Beethoven’s masterpieces. Or imagine 
the nerve expenditure in the modern de- 
velopment of typewriting, which now oc- 
cupies thousands of our girls. One of 
these dexterous young women is just re- 
ported in the papers as having accurately 
written 4,069 “taps’—letters requiring 
selection—in five minutes—eight hundred 
and twelve a minute—more than four- 
teen each second! And all such action 
painless! 

But that is by no means all. There are 
four times as many afferent nerves as 
there are efferent. What does that mean? 
Much more than can here be specified. 
But how much, may be gathered from the 
fact that whole age-long controversies 
about free will and determinism, have 
somehow to be solved here—if they are 
soluble at all. The plain fact is that 
every hour of every day there are more 
than 10,000,000 nerve fibers, far more 


[ 58 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


delicate than all the wit of man can fash- 
ion, or the speech of man describe, at our 
service. And of all this service, the av- 
erage man in a normal condition knows 
nothing. For unless he has marred this 
indescribably intricate machine by evil 
habits, it all works painlessly, as required, 
throughout the year. 

(9) It must be specially noted that the 
specific instances here mentioned as illus- 
trating the mystery of painlessness, are 
merely a partial and superficial summary 
of the actual facts. Modern physiology 
gives a far more intricate and correspond- 
ingly wonderful account of the house we 
live in. For instance, the following facts 
deserve much fuller notice and deeper 
appreciation. 

The nervous system is really much 
more complicated than has just been de- 
scribed, and it may be useful to quote 
hereupon some recent significant words of 
Sir Arthur Keith, of the Royal College 
of Surgeons: 


[ 59 |] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


“That there exists in the human body a uni- 
versal and extremely complex system of inter- 
communication, corresponding to our postal 
organization, is now a matter which modern 
physiologists have placed beyond doubt. 'These 
missives get the name of hormones (Starling, 
1905) ; they are of many kinds, corresponding 
in number to the needs of the body. In reality 
these missives, or hormones, represent a par- 
ticular kind of letter. They are of the nature 
of a writ or summons. The unit or assemblage 
of units receiving such summonses have no op- 
tion; they must respond. ‘They obey auto- 
matically. We may say, in truth, that the cells 
or units of the body human represent an im- 
mense assemblage of conscript citizens.” 


Still further Sir Arthur remarks that 


“Certain clusters of units, such as the pitui- 
tary and pineal] glands, the thyroid and adrenal 
bodies, become specialists in the manufacture of 


hormones.” 


It is well for us that such manufacture 
goes on. For the blessed unconsciousness 
which we call health, depends immeasur- 


[ 60 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


ably upon the regular work of these and 
other ductless glands. The apostle’s de- 
lineation, 1900 years ago, can scarcely 
be improved upon, with all our modern 
knowledge. 


“, . . all the body fitly framed and knit to- 
gether through that which every joint supplies, 
according to the working in due measure of each 
several part, makes the increase of the body 
unto the building up of itself in love.” 


“Love” here may be well translated 
painlessness. For what if all these sev- 
eral parts did not thus work? No one 
thinks anything of what his spleen is do- 
ing for him. Yet all the time it is destroy- 
ing worn-out red blood-cells, and forming 
new white ones. So, too, the lymphatic 
glands, of which no one ever thinks, are 
always forming new white blood-cells, as 
well as catching and destroying noxious 
microbes and cancer cells. As to the thy- 
roid and adrenal bodies—if the former 
were inactive, the terrible diseases known 


[ 61 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


as myxcedema or cretinism would soon 
make life a misery and a burden. Whilst 
the latter form an essential part of the 
normally painless but most complex ex- 
cretory work of. the kidneys, without 
which life would end in a few days. 
Equally necessary to life and health is 
the tiny pituitary body. Not one person 
in ten thousand knows or cares that his 
head contains such a little double gland, 
but without it he could not go on to live. 
Once more let a duly qualified expert sum 
up the case for us. Dr. Macfie writes: 


“All these glands, then—spleen, lymphatic 
glands, thyroid gland, adrenal bodies, and 
pitutiary body—play most interesting, impor- 
tant and mysterious parts in the economy of 
the body, and teach us what a wonderful and 
mysterious organism the body is. Who would 
have imagined that a tiny gland within the skull 
would influence the growth of the skeleton? 
Who would have thought that disease of the 
little adrenal caps of the kidneys would produce 
a bronzing of the skin? Who would have 


[ 62 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


thought that a little deficiency of thyroid secre- 
tion would produce myxcedema and cretinism? 
Yes, so it is.” 

Still more, who would have imagined 
that all these, and a myriad other compli- 
cated processes, could go on inside a hu- 
man body day by day, year in and year 
out, and the highly sensitive man or 
woman know nothing of their existence, 
because they all work so painlessly? Only 
today I met in the street a man who, in 
an active life for more than eighty years, 
had never known, and does not now know, 
that such things were going on within. 

(10) Nor does he, in common with 
myriads more, know, except by hearsay, 
that he has a liver. But the physician 
knows; and so do the advertisers without 
number who urge their pills or salts as the 
only panacea for a healthy happy life. 
What do such quacks know or care really 
about the liver? Nothing at all; save that 
it sometimes fails to act normally, and so 
gives them their opportunity to relieve 


[ 63 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


you—of your money. But in very deed 
there is something to consider. The old 
humorous reply to the question, “Is life 
worth living?” has indeed as much truth 
in it physically as morally. “Depends on 
the liver.” For this liver'is “not only the 
largest gland in the body, but it has 
greater chemical versatility than any 
other gland.” Assuming, as we must, 
that a healthy liver is a sine qua non of 
general health and happiness—what does 
that involve? When this large mass of 
brownish substance is examined in mod- 
ern light, what do we find? Only this: 
that it is composed of some 14,000,000,- 
000,000 cells, each of which cells is in 
turn composed of 64,000,000,000 groups, 
known as molecules, and these molecules 
contain some 300,000,000,000,000 atoms. 
So that if any average man should be 
curious to know how many living atoms 
he daily carries about with him in this 
part of his body alone he has only to write 
down forty-two, and after it put twenty- 


[ 64 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


six ciphers. And that staggering ‘esti- 
mate will not be either imagination or 
guess work, but sober fact. 

All these—if he is physically “well”— 
are not only living but working. And not 
only working but agreeing; each doing its 
individual part. Then, without strikes, 
or quarrels, they all join together to pro- 
duce that strange but most necessary fluid 
which we call bile. Every day as much as 
two pints of this yellowish or greenish 
fluid must be manufactured; and either 
pass at once into the duodenum for imme- 
diate use, or be stored up in the gall blad- 
der. But this is far from all that every 
mortal owes to this forgotten or despised 
organ. For it not only makes bile, but 
stores glucose, a kind of sugar, as gly- 
cogen, and then turns the glycogen into 
glucose again when the tissues call for it. 
Besides which, the liver also prepares fats 
for the use of tissues, and together with 
the pancreas, builds up complex fats con- 
taining phosphorus, which are important 


[ 65 ] 





THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


items in the nervous system. If, how- 
ever, the pancreas does not act, diabetes 
sets in. ‘The point to be noted here, is 
that literally millions of men and women 
are always in blissful unconsciousness that 
they have either pancreas or liver, by rea- 
son of the painless regularity with which 
these do their most important and indeed 
absolutely necessary work. 

(11) Let us now turn to what may be 
considered a higher realm, namely that of 
our sense perceptions. We pity the poor 
blind—and rightly, for the preciousness 
of good sight is quite beyond words to 
estimate. But out of the myriads of men 
and women who possess it, are there many 
—say one in twenty thousand—excluding 
doctors and scientists—who appreciate 
what that means, or know what it in- 
cludes, even if they had each only one 
eye? Think of it fora moment. <A beau- 
tiful little ball in a tough protecting skin; 
filled with transparent jelly; provided 
with two delicate, wonderful lenses; and 


[ 66 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


having, at the back, a retina with twelve 
distinct layers of delicate nerve-structure, 
containing—though only one hundred and 
twentieth of an inch thick—3,000,000 rods 
and 4,000,000 cones, all of which are abso- 
lutely necessary for clear vision. By 
means of these, ethereal vibrations are 
conveyed to the base of the brain, by an 
optic nerve which is itself composed of at 
least 500,000 fibers. It seems a shame to 
have to leave unmentioned all the other 
wonderful and beautiful arrangements, 
through which a landscape covering many 
square miles is reproduced to our con- 
sciousness on a small portion of the tiny 
space at the back of the eye. 

But again. It cannot be overlooked 
that with this wonderful organ we are also 
able to distinguish color. Here we may 
pity the poor color-blind whom occasion- 
ally one meets. Only it ought not to be 
forgotten that the raptures of the artist’s 
eye, and the little child’s delight at a feast 
of color, require a corresponding appa- 


[ 67 J 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


ratus. ‘Thus, in order to appreciate the 
beauty of a scarlet geranium, the eye has 
to be sensitive to ethereal vibrations at the 
rate of 500,000,000,000,000 per second; 
and if we then turn to admire a violet, 
half as many more vibrations have to 
come In. 

Is that all? No; it is very far from all 
the marvels of even one healthy human 
eye. But have we not each two eyes? 
And with our two eyes do we not see one 
object? Still further, let the reader who, 
we hope, is thus endowed, close one eye for 
a while, and with the other either read on 
or look around him, for a few minutes. 
When he then resumes his ordinary ca- 
pacity, does not the improved stereoscopic 
vision compel him to pity the poor one- 
eyed man? How, then, when justice is 
done to all the indescribable complications 
of one eye, does it come to pass that our 
two eyes work together with such com- 
plete and painless harmony as to make 
us forget, all day long, that we are using 


[ 68 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


two wondrous organs at once? Out of a 
million of our fellows so endowed, how 
many appreciate what they are using 
every minute? Until a tiny speck of dust 
gets into the eye and reminds them. 

(12) But to be deaf is, some say, as 
great a calamity as to be blind. The late 
George Matheson, the blind mystic, used 
to say that it was greater. Does the ordi- 
nary man or woman, then, ever think of 
the painless mystery which enshrouds 
their powers of hearing? No; they are so 
engrossed with their musical evenings and 
their wireless, that they have neither time 
nor thought for that. Even at their grand 
opera or at a delightful concert, where 
they revel in the harmonies of Beethoven 
or the rhapsodies of Chopin, or the 
grandeur of Bach—to say nothing of the 
rapturous melodies of a Galli-Curci or a 
_ Tetrazzini—how many in a thousand are 
there who ever ask how these raptures be- 
come possible? Or what a “musical ear” 
really means? 


[ 69 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


It is verily painful for anyone who does 
know something about it, to have to dis- 
miss it, as here, with a mere superficial 
reminder. For the real wonder-mystery 
of the internal ear alone, which is only a 
portion of the whole—completing as it 
does the function of the external and mid- 
dle ear—is far too great for a few words. 
The musician, as a rule, never thinks of it 
—takes it all for granted as a matter of 
course. So do his pupils, and his audi- 
ences. They quite acknowledge the mer- 
its of a Hardman or Steinway piano, and 
the priceless worth of a genuine “Strad” 
—utterly ignoring the duplicated marvel 
in their own heads, compared with which 
the best violins or pianos ever fashioned 
are as clumsy and coarse as a cart rope by 
the side of the hair of a little child. To- 
day, wireless enthusiasts without number 
praise their phones or loud-speaker be- 
cause they are so sensitive that they can 
communicate vibrations which only oc- 
cupy the one hundred-millionth part of 


[ 70 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


an inch. The fact that the human ear is 
just one million times more sensitive than 
that, does not appear to them to merit 
notice. In a word, only deafness or ear- 
ache serves to remind the average man or 
woman that the ears with which they hear 
are painlessly as well as wondrously serv- 
ing them, everywhere, and always. 

(13) Yet again. When through the 
interworking of such real though in- 
conceivable sensitiveness, our enthusiast, 
listening in, clearly distinguishes the voice 
of Sir Oliver Lodge, as he discourses upon 
the ether, or of a Congressman dis- 
cussing politics, does it ever occur to him 
to ask how it is that the famous physicist, 
or politician, can speak at all, let alone 
incarnate in their speech such knowledge 
and wisdom? No. We talk, and talk, 
and talk, all day long, on all sorts of 
themes, in all sorts of ways, without 
knowing or caring in the least that all 
our speech wholly and only depends upon 
the healthy functioning of a little portion 


[71 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


of one side only of our brain. And yet— 
all we have opportunity to say here is— 
just injure “Broca’s convolution” on the 
left side of the cerebrum, and no poli- 
tician would then deliver another speech, 
nor preacher another sermon, nor friend 
say another kindly word to friend. Yet 
through all the countless speeches, ser- 
mons, words of social intercourse which 
fill our hours, this wondrous interplay of — 
brain, and nerve, and muscle goes on, 
hour by hour, without friction, or pain, so 
unconsciously that it is universally for- 
gotten and ignored—until laryngitis or 
aphasia comes to act as reminder. 

(14) Before we leave this rough and 
superficial though truthful summary, 
there are yet two matters of greatest im- 
portance which must on no account be 
overlooked. Each of the items above- 
mentioned needs and deserves far more 
attention than could possibly be given to 
it in the whole of this book. Let that 
be borne well in mind. Then, and only 


[ 72 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


then, can the greatest mystery of all be 
apprehended. Namely, the inexpressible 
marvel of the codrdination of all these 
parts, so as to form one total, organic, 
conscious, painless unity. 

Sir Arthur Keith has been demonstrat- 
ing recently that the human body repre- 
sents a commonwealth, or rather “a slave 
state,” in which every unit “has to become 
a serf or slave to all the other members of 
the state.’’ But such a figure does not do 
justice to all the facts. In a common- 
wealth, say of a million human beings, 
there is manifest similarity between all the 
units. In spite of all differences of form 
or of opinion, they are all human, with 
corresponding needs, and functions, and 
tendencies. But in the human body there 
is no such similarity. Words fail to 
represent the unlikeness between the 
structure and functions of all the various 
parts named above. The marvels of such 
unlikeness only become really manifest 
after thorough research. 


[73 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


The complexity which we have to 
consider starts indeed with that human 
“ovum,” from which all else—somehow— 
follows. Its size is less than the dot on 
the letter “1” which is here printed. Yet 
careful calculation, not mere guessing, 
decides that in this infinitesimal initial 
ovum there are not less than 1,728,000,- 
000,000,000 molecules, containing thus, 
8,640,000,000,000,000,000 atoms. How 
intricately and mysteriously these develop 
into the distinctive organs which must all 
work together to make a healthy human 
body, we have seen in brief summary 
above. But to do justice to any one of 
these several portions and their functions, 
is really beyond our powers of thought. 
Who, for instance, can grasp even the 
truth that “in the end-joint of one’s little 
finger there are some 15,000,000 units’’— 
double the population of Greater Lon- 
don? In that joint, however, there are no 
quarrels, no strikes, no rebellions. Who 
has any pain in the end-joint of his little 


[74 ] 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


finger? But, also, who ever reflects that 
this means 15,000,000 units working in 
harmony ? 

Nor is that all. There is a bone in that 
little joint. Whence and how does it 
come there? It is but a fraction of the 
work of the body’s bone-builders, and con- 
cerning these, says Sir Arthur Keith—in 
a rationalist periodical—“there are some 
60,000,000,000 units of this bricklaying 
caste, in a human body.” And _ these 
never cry “Down tools’; nor restrict the 
number of bricks that may be laid in a 
day. All these incalculable and indescrib- 
able but real and active units are working 
together for good in an average human 
body. How many? The lowest estimate 
is a billion; but an equally scientific esti- 
mate reckons it in trillions. We will here 
be content with the lower number, on con- 
dition that the complicated relations of 
these units be steadily kept in view. Thus 
the liver cell, whose minuteness we try in 
vain to realize, is nevertheless compared 


[75 | 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


on scientific grounds, in its mechanical 
complexity, to “a Mauretania full of 
chronometers.”” The matter to be stressed 
here is that this whole vast universe of liv- 
ing parts, works together as one wnified 
whole in the normal human body, with 
such painlessness that the healthy man or 
woman knows nothing about it—does not 
know that he, or she, has a body at all, 
unless some fraction of this vast whole 
goes wrong, and consequent pain reminds 
him or her of the fact. 

(15) Yet if it be possible to imagine an 
even greater marvel, surely it is that which 
happens to all healthy mortals when their 
day’s work is done. Poets have sung 
about “Tired nature’s sweet restorer, 
balmy sleep”—but neither they nor all the 
men of science living, have been able to 
explain what sleep is, or how it comes to 
pass. We only know that somehow or 
other we must have it. No disease is more 
to be dreaded than real insomnia. Devel- 
oping civilization makes sleep more diffi- 


[ 76 | 


“WONDERFULLY MADE” 


cult to insure than in savage times; it 
comes to children more easily than to 
adults. But what does it mean? Do not 
those who sleep best, think least about it? 
Well, happily for us, it does not mean 
that all the wondrous work of the body, 
so roughly sketched above, ceases. In 
some respects it goes on more efficiently 
than ever; which accounts for our being 
refreshed, after a good night’s sleep. 

It seems as if certain parts of the body 
have to be wound up like a thirty-hour 
clock. But has anyone such a clock which 
can be wound up absolutely noiselessly ? 
Yet if the noise may represent pain, it is 
thus that the healthy man, after his weary- 
ing day is, painlessly, wound up in readi- 
ness for the next. We wish each other 
“dreamless sleep.” But it really matters 
little whether we dream or not, so long as 
painless renewal goes on—as it does in 
the case of the incalculable majority of 
men, women, and children. The whole 
immeasurably complex organ _ unites, 


Lite] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


somehow, to shut off our sensations, and 
turn on ‘still more of that sympathetic 
nerve system which never ceases to work 
for us—and so we sleep—we know not 
how. ‘The deeper and sweeter and more 
refreshing the sleep, the less we know 
about it; with all the rest, it becomes a 
commonplace which only those who lose it 
know how to estimate as it deserves. 


[ 78 ] 


IV 
THE DIVINE SECRET 


S we close this poor summary, there 

is one thing which must be most 
definitely stated and duly emphasized. 
The whole of this summary—and all else 
which it includes—is indeed true. These 
facts and figures are not fictions, 'They 
are not sentimental imaginations, ‘They 
are realities. They represent the unques- 
tionable actualities of every painless hour, 
in every living human being. It is for 
each reader to sum up and ask himself, 
herself, how many such hours he has 
had. For myself, I can but record—with 
thankfulness beyond expression—that I 
have had more than 600,000 such hours. 
For which reason, as a rationalist, no less 
than as a Christian, in the light of our 
modern knowledge, I am bound to con- 


[79 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


sider the significance of all these hours, 
even more carefully and deeply than could 
the writer of Psalm One Hundred and 
Thirty-nine. Nor can I possibly overlook 
the fact that I am surrounded by great 
numbers of my fellows who have had 
almost if not quite as many painless 
hours—and by not a few who have had 
more. So, when problems of pain, in- 
stances of suffering, compass me about, 
such as I can neither deny nor honestly 
minimize, and I am tempted to echo the 
other Psalmist who cried—in Moffatt’s 
rendering— 


“I almost slipped, I nearly lost my footing, 
In anger at the godless and their arrogance 
At the sight of their success. 

No pain is theirs, but sound strong health, 

°Tis all in vain I have kept my heart from — 
stain, kept my life clean 

When all day long blows fall wpon me, 

And every dawn brought me some chasten- 
ing 

I am compelled by other facts—facts 


[ 80 ] 


33 
e 


THE DIVINE SECRET 


which are simple, actual, scientific, daily, 
personal, and innumerable realities—to 
put into his words a meaning he could not 
foresee. 


*“ So I thought of tt, thinking to fathom it 
—but it sorely troubled me, 
Til I found out God’s secret.” 


There I cannot but leave the Psalmist 
behind. For that secret to me is not what 
then satisfied him. I have more knowl- 
edge, more opportunity, more hope, than 
he had. The open secret to me is not the 
sure and swift mortality of evildoers, but 
the present universal beneficence of the 
divine intention, and this ceaseless work- 
ing of the mystery of good, when not 
marred or prevented by human sin and 
folly. It is to this conclusion that one so 
far from Christianity as Sir E. Ray Lan- 
kester testifies, in his Romanes Lecture: 


“In the extra-human system of Nature, there 
is no disease. . . . The adjustment of organ- 


[ 81 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


isms to their surrounding is so severely com- 
plete in Nature, apart from man, that diseases 
are unknown as constant and normal phenom- 
ena, under those conditions. . . . It seems to 
be a legitimate view that every disease to which 
animals (and probably plants also) are liable, 
excepting as a transient and very exceptional 


occurrence, is due to man’s interference.” 


In this whole divine secret of normal 
painlessness, then, there are at least seven 
things to be duly considered and appreci- 
ated. Here they can only be mentioned. 
But if for every event there must be for 
our minds, so long as we are sane, an ade- 
quate cause, then we are driven to ask 
ourselves some very pertinent questions 
concerning these realities which we have 
passed in such brief review. ‘The other 
marvels of this overwhelming universe 
may be postponed. It is enough that we 
learn to appreciate ourselves. One must 
ask these queries at least. 

(1) How all these undeniable marvels 
in our ordinary bodies have come to be 


[ 82 ] 


THE DIVINE SECRET 


what they are. The magic word of today 
is Evolution—which may mean every- 
thing or nothing. No one indeed knows 
_ how it works, or how variations or muta- 
tions come to pass. But all that is needed 
is time; so that amid the incalculable mul- 
tiplications of purely accidental muta- 
tions, through “blind chance”’ the least 
able to survive may be eliminated, and 
only the vigorous and healthy survive, 
and by procreation multiply. 

It does not enter into the scope of these 
pages to embark upon the Spencerian- 
Weismannian controversy, nor to discuss 
evolution in general. But any child can 
see that the attribution of all that has even 
here preceded, to blind chance, is a sheer 
counsel of contradiction and despair. The 
mystery of the painless adaptations sum- 
marized may be left to speak for itself, if 
we take one illustration to make it clear. 
There are twenty-six letters in the En- 
glish alphabet. On this page there are 
possibly two hundred words, which, it is 


[ 83 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


hoped, convey some sense. We are told 
that “it has taken Nature at least one hun- 
dred million years to elaborate the society 
represented by a child’s body,” and that 
this wondrous microcosm, in the child, 
has come to pass by “purely accidental 
variation under no guidance save blind 
chance.” Let us, then, put one thousand 
letters of our alphabet, formed of the 
same metal which printed this page, into 
a machine capable of jostling them fortu- 
itously for one hundred million years. 
Shall we then have the words, and the 
sense of them, which are here before us? 
Any child will see and say that it is ridicu- 
lous, so must every sane man. But we 
have to think not of two hundred words 
and their significance—but of at least bil- 
lions of living units which have so come 
to form adaptations, in myriads of ways, 
that millions of human beings have thou- 
sands of painless hours, in which all the 
activities of their nature may find un- 
hindered opportunities for development. 


[ 84 ] 


THE DIVINE SECRET 


In face of such realities, evolution as the 
divine method of creation may be indeed 
both true and sufficient, far surpassing in 
grandeur, as Darwin acknowledged, the 
former Paleyan conception of special cre- 
ation. But atheistic or agnostic evolution 
is sheer irrationalism, and only a philos- 
ophy for the wilfully blind. The ques- 
tions which must ever press for answer to 
that effect are such as follow here. 

(2) How, in the marvel-mystery of — 
their individual functioning, each of them 
is not only thus perfected, but maintained 
from hour to hour, through all the years? 

(3) How, in their incalculable number, 
they come to be so codrdinated as to form 
such an indescribably complex, cease- 
lessly working, but definitely unified or- 
ganic whole, as the human body? 

(4) How all this coordination is pain- 
lessly carried on from day to day, so that 
we know nothing of it, and do nothing 
towards it? Indeed, our sympathetic sys- 
tem does its work best, normally, without 


[ 85 | 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


our conscious interference at all. The 
problem of the physician often is how to 
get a patient to let himself alone. 

(5) How, when such portions as we do 
control become temporarily used up, and 
we are tired, the insoluble mystery of 
sleep restores their vigor, and renews 
our life? 

(6) How, when noxious influences— 
disease germs—attack us, or le in wait 
for us with ill potentialities, inside the 
body, as they continually do, our phago- 
cytes, the white cells manufactured for us 
without our knowing it, unbidden, watch 
to defend us, and attack the intruders? 
And how, when accident or injury over- 
takes us, these internal renewers—unless 
tied and bound by the folly of imbibed 
alcohol—come immediately, unasked, to 
build up the tissues again, “by first 
intention’’? 

(7) Last, but surely not least, it must 
be noted that in all this there is absolutely 
no respect of persons. It is all as real and 


[ 86 | 


THE DIVINE SECRET 


efficient for the meanest pauper as for any 
king or queen. The poorest tramp is 
herein cared for quite as much as any 
aristocrat. So that if the world’s popu- 
lation is now accurately estimated as 
approximately 1,800,000,000, then, with 
comparatively few exceptions, all these 
are incarnations of the mystery of pain- 
lessness, and this wonder of wonders is the 
norm of human life, whatever the excep- 
tions may amount to. ‘The manifest 
tendency for all ordinary thinkers is to 
make too little of the normal, just because 
it is the normal; and too much of the ex- 
ceptions, just because, being exceptions, 
they draw upon themselves unusual atten- 
tion. No one with a heart will deny the 
reality and the poignancy of the mystery | 
of pain, alike as to its extent and inten- | 
sity. But no one with a head, viewing — 
fairly the whole realm of human exis- 
tence, can contradict the estimate that it 
sinks into comparative insignificance, be- 
side this boundless, ceaseless, measureless 


[87] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


mystery of painlessness, which prevails 
throughout all nature, and means most of 
all in and for human nature. 

Our modern organs, in churches and 
halls, are marvels of structure and adap- 
tation. It is difficult to imagine what 
would be the delight of a Bach, or a 
Beethoven, or a Mozart, if they could be 
resuscitated and permitted to render one 
of their matchless compositions on such an 
instrument. Yet the very best of them is 
but a crude and clumsy toy compared with 
the normal human body. It has become 
the custom in some quarters to refer to 
our bodies as machines, but such a term 
may be altogether misleading in failing to 
do justice to the reality. For as Leibnitz 
said :— 


“The organic body of each living thing is a 
kind of divine machine or natural, automaton, 
but it infinitely surpasses all artificial auto- 
mata. For a machine made by the skill of man 
is not a machine in each of its parts. The tooth 
of a brass wheel, for instance, has parts and 


[ 88 ] 


THE DIVINE SECRET 


fragments which have not the special character- 
istics of the machine; whereas the machines of 
Nature, namely, living bodies, are still ma- 
chines in their smallest parts ad infinitum. It 
is this that constitutes the difference between 
Nature and Art, that is to say, between the 


divine art and ours.” 


Consider, then, one of the best of our 
modern machines for producing music. 
And imagine that in the course of its em- 
ployment, one or two notes should get out 
of tune; or some of the “trackers” should 
“cipher”; or some pneumatic tube or 
“spotted metal” pipe out of the 10,000 
should go wrong. Would anyone, short 
of a lunatic, cry out either that there had 
been no organ builder, or that he must 


have been a fool, if not a knave? Yet | 


that is what the favorite indictment of 
rationalistic disbelief amounts to, in face 
of all the facts of human existence. For 
these include the universal, continual, and 
painless, that is flawless, use of an instru- 
ment infinitely more marvelous and com- 


[ 89 | 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


plex than any organ or machine that the 
wit of man has ever conceived, or will ever 
construct. 

It is not religion, therefore, so much as 
common sense, not sentiment but honesty, 
not pietism but well-warranted gratitude, 
which leads a thoughtful man to say, 
“Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget 
not all his benefits!” 

As to what is in us besides the brain, or 
what will be for us hereafter beyond the 
grave, nothing is here said, though much 
may be inferred. In the case of a fine 
organ, say with five manuals and a hun- 
dred stops, which took ten years to build, 
it would hardly be thought to have justi- 
fied its construction if, after being used 
for five minutes, it were dismantled and 
reduced to fragments. But since we are 
told that it has taken one hundred million 
years to produce a human being—if after 
life’s brief moment, nothing is to be left 
as the result of all that travail but a hand- 
ful of dust, then Tennyson and Fiske 


[ 90 ] 


THE DIVINE SECRET 


were both of them right. The latter in 
his emphatic avowal that 


“The more thoroughly we comprehend that 
process of evolution through which things have 
come to be what they are, the more we are likely 
to feel that to deny the everlasting persistence 
of the spiritual element in man, is to rob the 
whole process of its meaning. It goes far 
toward putting us to permanent intellectual 


confusion.”’ 


Whilst the former adds all the force of 
poetry to such an estimate. If all the 
marvels of human evolution end in his 
being “blown about the desert dust, or 
sealed within the iron hills”— 


“No more? A monster then, a dream, 
A discord, dragons of the prime 
That tare each other m their slime, 
Were mellow music matched with him.” 
mr 
~ For the moment we leave all that is thus 
suggested, to other occasions. All that 
has been mentioned above is but as the 


porch of a palace; but none the less won- 


[ 91 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


derful or significant for that. Tennyson, 
after all, did it but scanty justice when 
he wrote— 


“ The Lord let the house of a brute to the soul 
of a man, 
And the man satd—am I your debtor? 
And the Lord said—keep it as clean as you 
can, 
And then I will let you a better.” 


The apostle was much nearer the truth 
when he asked the Corinthians the ques- 
tion quoted above, and all the latest 
knowledge of ourselves that modern sci- 
ence can supply goes to emphasize his 
appeal—“‘Glorify God, therefore, in your 
body.” 

That certainly, if there were nothing 
else in the New Testament, is in itself 
sufficient and final contradiction, and 
Christian condemnation of the cult now 
calling itself Christian Science. For this 
dismisses as unworthy of notice all the 
wondrous elements which, as we have 


[ 92 ] 


THE DIVINE SECRET 


seen, constitute in their co-working the 
mystery of painlessness, and under the 
guise of a false philosophy flouts all true 
science by propagating the absurdity that 
the human body is a myth, and all pain is 
a delusion. The public menace of such 
fanaticism is even more serious than the 
private delusion, as has been shown above. 
The scorn which this modern gnosticism 
pours not only upon the human body, but 
upon the noble workers in science and 
medicine who are daily saving lives and 
improving the health of the nation, calls 
for reiterated condemnation. ‘There is 
not one single consistent Eddyist living. 
For every day of their lives they renew 
their “myth” with food, and do all their 
work in painless peace, not because pain 
is mere imagination, but because the bod- 
ies which they despise, but the apostle so 
honored and bade us honor, are all the 
time in the myriad ways outlined above, 
by means of a thousand million real and 
active parts, working together for good, 


[ 93 ] 


THE MYSTERY OF PAINLESSNESS 


and calling upon us one by one to hallow 
the temple which is our present abode, by 
all holy living and noble endeavor. 

Thus by gratefully appreciating all the 
benevolent marvels of our daily existence 
as the years pass on, when shadows fall 
upon us, at least memory may help to keep 
us from losing faith and hope. Even as in 
the case of that lofty specimen of what 
humanity may become—William Ewart 
Gladstone. At the last, after his long and 
honorable career, cancer held him in its 
fell grip. It is reported that one day a 
sympathizing friend said to him—‘“Oh, 
Mr. Gladstone, I fear you have had much 
pain these last six months.” 'To which he 
replied—“Yes, my friend, I have. But 
that is no reason why I should forget that 
I have had twice eighty-six times six 
months free from pain.” That is not only 
piety; it is the truest reason and the fair- 
est justice. For the rest, the Christian 
hope suffices, whether we set more or less 
value upon those phenomena of modern 


[94] 


THE DIVINE SECRET 


psychical research, which are most loudly 
contemned by those who have least studied 
them. In any case, the words with which 
Dr. Macfie concludes his valuable work on 
The Romance of the Human Body, apply 
to all the preceding summary, and may 
well serve to close its reminder that we are 
“fearfully and wonderfully made.” 


“These are but broken glimpses, incoherent 
fragments of the truth; but such glimpses and 
such fragments are enough to save us from de- 
spair, and to give us a belief that death may be 
but the portal to a yet ‘ fuller life.’ ” 


Printed in the United States of America 


[ 95 ] 








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